The Huguenot Part 9

"Oh, I do not think that such an advantage," said the Chevalier. "It is the duty of a woman to be handsome; but I think men have a right to be ugly if they like."

"So say I," replied Pelisson; "but Mademoiselle de Scudery says that I abuse the privilege, and upon my word I think so, for just before I came from Paris something happened which is worth telling. I was walking along," he continued, "quite soberly and thoughtfully down the Rue de Beauvoisis--you know that little street that leads up by the convent of St. Mary--when coming opposite to a large house nearly at the corner, I was suddenly met by as beautiful a creature as ever I saw, with her soubrette by her side, and her loup in her hand, so that I could quite see her face. She was extremely well dressed, and, in fact, altogether fit to be the G.o.ddess of an Idyl. However, as I did not know her, I was pa.s.sing quietly on, when suddenly she stopped, took me by the hand, and said, in an earnest voice, 'Do me the pleasure, sir, of accompanying me for one moment.' On my word, gentlemen, I did not know what was going to happen, but I was a great deal too gallant, of course, to refuse her; when, without another word, she led me to the door of the house, up the stairs, rang the bell on the first floor, and conducted me into an anteroom. A servant threw open another door for her; and then bringing me into a second room, where I found a gentleman of good mien with two sticks in his hand, she presented me to him with these singular words: '_Line for line, sir, like that! Remember, line for line, sir, like that!_' and then turning on her heel she walked away, leaving me petrified with astonishment. The gentleman in whose presence I stood seemed no less surprised for a moment than myself; but the instant after he burst into a violent fit of laughter, which made me a little angry.

"'Pray, sir, what is the meaning of all this?' I asked. 'Do you not know that lady?' he rejoined. 'No, sir,' I replied, 'I neither know her nor you.' 'Oh, as for me,' replied the gentleman, 'you have seen me more than once before, Monsieur Pelisson, though you do not know me. I am Mignard, the painter; but as to the lady, I must either not give you the clue to her bringing you here, or not give you her name, which you like.' 'Give me the clue; give me the clue,' replied I: 'the lady's name I will find out hereafter.'

"'Do not be offended then,' he said, 'but the truth is, I am painting for that lady a picture of the temptation in the wilderness. She came to see it this morning, and a violent dispute arose between us as to how I was to represent the devil; she contending that he was to be excessively ugly, and I, that though disfigured by bad pa.s.sions, there was to be the beauty of an angel fallen. She left me a minute ago in a fit of playful pettishness, when lo and behold she returns almost instantly, bringing you in her hand, and saying, 'Line for line, like that.' I leave you to draw your own conclusion."

"I did draw my own conclusion," continued Pelisson, "and got out of the way of Monsieur Mignard's brush as fast as possible, only saying, that I thought the lady very much in the wrong, for there could lie no great temptation under such an exterior as mine."

His auditors laughed both at the story and at the simplicity with which it was told, and no one laughed more heartily than the black-faced priest. But while he was chuckling on his seat, Maitre Jerome, who had glided round behind him, suddenly seized hold of two leathern strings that hung down over the edge of the chair, and exclaiming, "That must be very inconvenient to your reverence," he pulled out from underneath him, by a sudden jerk which nearly laid him at his length on the floor, the identical sheep-skin bag which had nearly been burnt to pieces in the wood.

The priest started up with terror and dismay, exclaiming, "Give it to me: give it to me, sirrah. How dare you take it from under me? It is the King's commission to Messieurs Pelisson and St. Helie for putting down heresy in Poitou."

A sudden grave look and a dead silence succeeded this unexpected announcement; but while the priest s.n.a.t.c.hed the packet from Jerome Riquet's profane hands, declaring that he had promised not to part with it for a moment, Pelisson made his voice heard, saying,

"You mistake, my good brother; such is not the object of the commission, as the King explained it to me. On the contrary, his Majesty said that, when it was opened at Poitiers, we would find that the whole object and scope of it was to heal the religious differences of the province in the mildest and most gentle manner possible."

"I trust it may be found so, Monsieur Pelisson," replied the Count gravely, turning his eyes from the Abbe de St. Helie, who said nothing. "I trust it may be found so;" and though it was evident that some damp was thrown upon his good spirits, he turned the conversation courteously and easily to other subjects: while Jerome Riquet, satisfied in regard to the nature of the packet, made a thousand apologies to the Cure of Guadrieul, loaded his plate with delicacies, and then returned to his master's elbow.

After supper, for so the meal was then called, the party separated.

The Chevalier d'Evran, for motives of his own, attached himself closely, for the time being, to the Abbe de St. Helie, and engaged him in a party at trick track; the young Count strolled out in the evening light with Pelisson, both carefully avoiding any religious subjects from the delicacy of their mutual position; the fat priest went to gossip with Maitre Jerome, and smoke a pipe in the kitchen of the inn; and the serving men made love to the village girls, or caroled in the court-yard.

Thus ended the first day's journey of the Count de Morseiul towards Poitiers. On the following morning he had taken his departure before the ecclesiastics had risen, leaving the servants, who were to follow with the horses, to make them fully aware that they had been his guests during their stay at the inn; and on the third day, at about five o'clock in the afternoon, he came under the high rocky banks which guard the entrance to the ancient city which was to be the end of his journey.

CHAPTER VI.

THE LADY AND HER LOVERS.

The city of Poitiers is a beautiful old town, at least it is a town in which there is much to interest; the memories of many remote periods cross and intersect each other, like the arches of a Gothic church, forming a fretwork over head of varied and solemn, though dim, a.s.sociations. The Roman, and the Goth, and the Frank, and the Englishman, have all there left indelible traces of their footsteps; and each spot through the streets of that city, and through the neighbouring country, is shadowed or brightened by the recollection of great and extraordinary deeds in the past. There is something in it, also, unlike any other town in the world; the number and extent of its gardens, the distance between its various houses, would make it look more like an orchard than a town, did not, every here and there, rise up some striking edifice, some fine church, bearing in its windows the leopards, or the fleurs de lis, as the case may be; a townhouse, a broken citadel, or a Roman amphitheatre in ruins, and all amidst rich green gardens, and grapes, and flowering shrubs.

The Count de Morseiul and his train, after pa.s.sing the gates of the city, which were then duly watched and warded, rode on to the house of the governor, which was, at that time, in the great square. It had probably been a Roman building, of which part of the portico had been preserved, forming the end of one of the wings; for, during three or four centuries, a tall porch had remained there supported by three columns. Though the princ.i.p.al gate was in the centre of the house, it was usual for the people of the town to enter by this porch; and such was the only purpose that it served. The whole aspect of the place has been altered long since; the governor's house has been changed into an inn, where I have slept on more than one occasion; and of the three columns nothing more remains but the name, which has descended to the hotel. It was in that time, however, a large brick building, with an immense arched gateway in the centre, under which Goliath of Gath himself might have pa.s.sed on horseback with a feather in his cap.

Beyond this was the inner court, with the usual buildings around it; but upon a large and magnificent scale, and on the left, under the arch-way, rose a wide flight of stone steps, leading to the princ.i.p.al apartments above.

Throughout the whole town, and especially in the neighbourhood of the governor's house, there appeared, on the day of the Count's arrival, a greater degree of bustle and activity than Poitiers generally displays; and as he drew up his horse under the archway, to ascend the stairs, several peasant girls, after pausing to look at the cavaliers, pa.s.sed on into the courts beyond, loaded with baskets full of flowers, and fruit, and green branches.

As he had sent on a messenger the day before to announce his approach, the Count de Morseiul knew that he was expected; and it was evident, from the sudden rushing forth of all the servants, the rapid and long ringing of the great bell, which went up stairs, and a thousand other such signs, that orders had been given to treat him with especial distinction. While some of the masters of the stable took possession of his grooms and horse-boys, to show them to the place appointed for them, two other servants, in costumes which certainly did honour to the taste of M. le Marquis Auguste de Hericourt, marshalled the Count and the Chevalier--followed by their respective valets and pages, without which men of their rank and fortune travelled not in that day--to the vestibule at the top of the staircase.

A step beyond the door of the vestibule, which was also a step beyond what etiquette required, the governor of the province was already waiting to receive the Count de Morseiul. He was a frank, amiable, and kind-hearted old gentleman, as tall, and as thin, and as brown as a cypress tree; and grasping the Count's hand, he welcomed him to Poitiers as an old friend, and the son of an old friend, and likewise, perhaps we might say, as one whose high character and fame, as a soldier, he greatly and sincerely admired. While speaking to the Count so eagerly that he saw nothing else, the governor felt a hand laid upon his arm, and, turning, beheld the Chevalier, whom he welcomed also warmly, though in a peculiar tone of intimacy which he had not used towards the Count de Morseiul.

"Ah, d'Evran," he said, "what brought you here, mad boy? I wanted not to see you; but I can tell you I shall put you in a garret, as you deserve, for the house is filled to the doors. This is our first grand reception, our little provincial _appartement_. All the n.o.bility in the neighbourhood are flocking in, and, as we cannot lodge them all, we are obliged to begin our entertainment as early as possible, in order to suffer some of them to get home betimes. This must plead my apology, my dear Count, for not giving you more s.p.a.cious apartments yourself, and for not taking you at once to the d.u.c.h.ess, who is all anxiety to see our hero. Some refreshments shall be taken to you in your own apartment, to your little salon, where, perhaps, you will give a corner to this wild Chevalier; for there is that young puppy Hericourt, who only arrived last night, up to the elbows in the dining-room in all sort of finery and foolery."

"But where is la belle Clemence?" demanded the Chevalier. "Where is the beauty of beauties? Will she not give me a quarter of an hour in her boudoir, think you, Duke?"

"Get along with you," replied the Duke: "Clemence does not want to see you. Go and refresh yourself with the Count: by that time we shall have found a place to put you in; and when you have cast off your dusty apparel, ransacked the perfumers, sought out your best lace, and made yourself look as insupportably conceited as you used to do two years ago at Versailles, it will be time for you to present yourself in our reception-room, and there you can see Clemence, who, I dare say, will laugh at you to your heart's content."

"So be it--so be it," replied the Chevalier, with a well-satisfied air. "Come, Count, we must obey the governor: see if he do not make himself as despotic here as his Majesty in Paris. Which is our way, Monsieur de Rouvre?" and with that appearance of indifference which has always been a current sort of affectation with men of the world, from the days of Horace downwards, he followed the servants to the handsome apartments prepared for the Count de Morseiul, which certainly needed no apology.

On the table the Count found a packet of letters, which M. de Rouvre had brought for him from Paris. They contained nothing of any great importance, being princ.i.p.ally from old military companions; but after the Chevalier had taken some refreshments with him, and retired to the apartments which had been prepared in haste for him, the Count took up the letters, and, carried forward by the memory of old times, went on reading, forgetful of the necessity of dressing himself for the approaching fete. He promised himself little or no pleasure indeed therein, for he expected to see few, if any, with whom he was acquainted; and his mind was too deeply occupied with important and even painful subjects, for him to think of mingling in lighter scenes with any very agreeable sensations.

He did not remember then the necessity of preparation, till he had to call for lights, and heard the roll of carriage-wheels, and the clattering of horses. He then, however, hastened to repair his forgetfulness; but Jerome was not as prompt and ready as usual, or else he was far more careful of his master's appearance. We will not, indeed, pause upon all the minute points of his toilet; but certainly, by the time that the valet would acknowledge that his master was fit to go down, he had given to the Count's fine person every advantage that dress can bestow; and perhaps Albert of Morseiul did not look at all the worse for that air of high and thoughtful intelligence, which the deep interests whereon his mind was fixed, called up in a countenance, with the fine and n.o.ble features of which, that expression was so peculiarly suited.

When, at length, he entered the little saloon that had been allotted to him, he found one of the officers of the governor waiting, with his own page, to conduct him to the reception-rooms; and, on asking if the Chevalier was ready, he found that he had been there seeking him, and had gone down. It was a slight reproach for his tardiness, and the Count hastened to follow. The way was not long, but the stairs had been left somewhat dark, as but little time had been given for preparation; and when the doors were opened for the young Count, a blaze of light and a scene of magnificence burst upon his eyes, which he had not been prepared to see in that remote part of France.

The rooms were brilliantly, though softly, lighted, and the princ.i.p.al blaze came from the great saloon at the farther end. Rich hangings and decorations were not wanting, but as they were, of course, to be procured with greater difficulty than in Paris, the places where many draperies would have hung, or where gilded scrolls, trophies, and other fanciful embellishments would have appeared, were filled up with much better taste from the storehouses of nature; and garlands, and green boughs, and the mult.i.tude of flowers which that part of the country produces, occupied every vacant s.p.a.ce. A very excellent band of musicians, which the Duke had brought with him from the capital, was posted in an elevated gallery of the great saloon; and the sweet notes of many popular melodies of the day came pouring down the long suite of apartments, softened, but not rendered indistinct by the distance. In the first chamber which the Count entered were a great number of the inferior officers of the governor, in their dresses of ceremony, giving that ante-chamber an air of almost regal state; and through the midst of them was pa.s.sing, at the moment, a party of the high n.o.bles of the province, who had just arrived before the Count came in.

Though not above one half of the invited had yet appeared, there were numerous groups in every part of the rooms; and at more than one of the tables, which, as customary in that age, were set out for play, the young Count found persons whom he knew, and stopped to speak with them as he advanced. The Duke and d.u.c.h.ess de Rouvre had taken their station in the great saloon; but in the smaller saloon immediately preceding it, Albert de Morseiul paused by one of the tables, to speak to the Prince de Marsillac, who was leaning against it; not playing, but turning his back with an air of indifference upon the scene beyond.

"Ah, Monsieur de Morseiul," he said, "it is an unexpected pleasure to see you here; I thought you were in Flanders."

"I was so fourteen days ago," replied the Count; "but as little did I expect to see you."

"Oh, this is in some sort my native country," replied the Prince; "and being here upon family affairs, I could not, of course, hesitate to come and grace the first entertainment of the good Duke. There seems a promise of a goodly a.s.sembly; and, indeed, there are attractions enough, what between a new governor, a new governess, and Clemence de Marly."

"And pray who is Clemence de Marly?" demanded the Count. "I am a rustic, you see, and have never yet heard of her."

"Rustic, indeed!" said the Prince; "why all the Parisian world is mad about her. She is the most admired, the most adored, I may say, of all the stars or comets, or what not, that have appeared in my day; as beautiful as Hebe, as graceful as the brightest of the Graces, as proud as Juno, about ten times colder than Diana, and as witty as Madame de Cornuel. People began to fancy that the King himself was in love with her; only you know that now, under the domination L'Amie de l'Amie, those days of folly and scandal have gone by, and, on my word, the saucy beauty treated majesty no better than she does n.o.bility. I myself heard her----"

"But who is Clemence de Marly?" demanded the Count again; "you have not satisfied me, Marsillac. Of what race or family is she? I know of no such name or family connected with the Rouvres."

The Prince replied in a lower tone, "She is an orphan, a foundling, an any thing you like. Some say," he added in a whisper, "a natural child of the King's own; but others again, and this is the true story, say that she is a natural child of De Rouvre's. There was a tale some time ago, you know, before he married, about him and the Countess de ----, a person of very large fortune; and as this girl has wealth at command, and lives always with the Rouvres, there can be no doubt of the matter. Madame de Rouvre, having no family, wisely treats her as her child, and spoils her as if she were her grandchild. They used to say she was to be married to your friend the Chevalier d'Evran, whom I saw hanging at her elbow just now. Hericourt vows that he will cut the throat of any man who marries her without his consent; but Louvois is supposed to have laid out a match for her even nearer to his race than that; Segnelai is not without hopes of carrying off the prize for some of his people; and they seem in these days to care no more for the bend sinister than if the Adam and Eve laws still prevailed, and we were all the children of nature together."

"This is the fair lady that d'Evran has been talking to me about,"

replied the Count; "but he talked of her and her beauty so coolly, that I can scarcely suppose he is much in love."

"Just come round hither and look at him then," said Marsillac, moving a little farther down, so as to give a fuller view into the other room. "You know d'Evran's way of being in love; lying down upon a sofa and playing with a feather fan, while the lady stands at the distance of two yards from him, and he says more clever things to her in five minutes than any body else can say in an hour. There he is doing it even now."

The Count moved slowly into the place which Marsillac had left for him, so as not to attract attention by flagrant examination of what was going on, and then raised his eyes towards the part of the great saloon at which the Prince had been looking. The group that they lighted on was certainly in every respect a singular one. In the centre of it stood or rather leaned beside a high-backed chair, in an att.i.tude of the most perfect grace that it is possible to conceive, which could not have been studied, for there was ease and nature in every line, a young lady, apparently of one or two and twenty years of age, whose beauty was both of a very exquisite and a very singular cast. It fully justified the description which had been given of it by the Chevalier d'Evran; the eyes were deep deep blue, but fringed with long and dark lashes, thickset but smooth, and sweeping in one even graceful fringe. The lips were, indeed, twin roses; the complexion delicately fair, and yet the face bearing in the cheek the warm hue of undiminished health. Those lips, even when not speaking, were always a little, a very little, parted, showing the bright pearl-like teeth beneath; the brow was smooth and fair, and yet the eyebrow which marked the exact line of the forehead above the eyes, changed, by the slightest elevation or depression, the whole aspect of the countenance with every pa.s.sing emotion. With every change, too, the other features harmonised, and there was a bright sparklingness about the face, even at that distance, which made it, to the eyes of the Count, resemble a lovely landscape in an early summer morning, where every thing seems fresh life and brightness. The ear, too, which was slightly turned towards them, was most beautiful; and the form, though the dress of that day did not serve to expose it much, was seen swelling through the drapery in every line of exquisite beauty. The hand, the arm, the foot, the neck and throat, were all perfect as any sculptor could have desired to model; and the whole, with the grace of the att.i.tude and the beauty of the expression, formed an object that one might have well wished to look at for long hours.

On the right of the lady, precisely as the Prince had described him, lay the Chevalier d'Evran, richly dressed, and, perhaps, affecting a little more indifference than he really felt. Half kneeling, half sitting, at her feet, was the Marquis de Hericourt, saying nothing, but looking up in her face with an expression which plainly implied that he was marveling whether she or himself were the loveliest creature upon earth. On her left hand stood a gentleman whom the Count instantly recognised as one of the highest and most distinguished n.o.bles of the court of Louis XIV., several years older than either the Marquis or the Chevalier, but still apparently as much if not more smitten than either. Behind her, and round about her, in various att.i.tudes, were half a dozen others, each striving to catch her attention for a single moment; but it was to the elder gentleman whom we have mentioned that she princ.i.p.ally listened, except, indeed, when some witticism of the Chevalier caused her to turn and smile upon him for a moment. Amongst the rest of the little train behind her were two personages, for neither of whom the Count de Morseiul entertained any very great esteem: the Chevalier de Rohan, a ruined and dissipated scion of one of the first families in France, and a gentleman of the name of Hatreoumont, whom the Count had known while serving with the army in Flanders, and who, though brave as a lion, bore such a character for restless and unprincipled scheming, that the Count had soon reduced their communication to a mere pa.s.sing bow.

All the rest of those who surrounded her were distinguished as far as high station and wealth went, and many were marked for higher and better qualities; but, in general, she seemed to treat them all as mere slaves, sending one hither with a message, and another thither for something that she wanted, with an air of proud command, as if they were born but to obey her will.

The group was, as we have said, an interesting and a curious one; but what was there in it that made the Count de Morseiul turn deadly pale?

What was there in it that made his heart beat with feelings which he had never known before in gazing at any proud beauty of this world?

What was it made him experience different sensations towards that lady, the first time that he beheld her, from those which he had ever felt towards others?

Was it the first time that he had ever beheld her? Oh, no. There, though the features were somewhat changed by the pa.s.sing of a few years, though the beauty of the girl had expanded into the beauty of the woman, though the form had acquired roundness and _contour_ without losing one line of grace, there, in that countenance and in that form, he beheld again the dream of his young imagination; there he saw her of whom he had thought so often, and with whose image he had sported in fancy, till the playfellow of his imagination had become the master of his feelings: and now that he did see her, he saw her in a situation and under circ.u.mstances that gave him pain. All the beauty of person indeed which he had so much admired was there; but all those charms of the heart and of the mind, which his fancy had read in the book of that beauty seemed now reversed, and he saw but a spoilt, proud, lovely girl, apparently as vain and frivolous as the rest of a vain and frivolous court.

"You are silent long, de Morseiul," said the Prince de Marsillac; "you are silent very long. You seem amongst the smitten, my good friend.

What! shall we see the fair lands and chateaux of the first Protestant gentleman in France laid at the feet of yon pretty dame? Take my advice, Morseiul; take the advice of an elder man than yourself. Order your horses to be saddled early to-morrow morning, and get you back to your castle or to the army. Even if she were to have you, Morseiul, she would never suit you: her heart, man, is as cold as a Russian winter, and as hard as the nether millstone, and never in this world will she love any other thing but her own pretty self."

"I am not at all afraid of her," replied the Count; "I have seen her before, and was only admiring the group around her."

"Seen her and forgotten her!" exclaimed Marsillac, "so as not to remember her when I spoke of her! In the name of Heaven let her not hear that. Nay, tell it not at the court, if you would maintain your reputation for wit, wisdom, and good taste. But I suppose, in fact, you are as cold as she is. Go and speak to her, Morseiul; go and speak to her, for I see indeed you are quite safe."